Mining ships

[Omega1967]

Mining ships

One of our players was showing me the Star Trek Fleet Commander game on his pad where he was mining ore from an asteroid. So I decided to generate the following. Why mine when a replicator can produce almost anything that the heart desires but for some reason the need to mine is there. I guess not everything can be replicated or the need for the materials that are needed to be used in the replicator

Mining Lasers

A typical mining laser is a combination of a laser, tractor beam and mineral processing system capable of lasering portions of rock from an asteroid tractor beaming it into and extracting the useful materials from the lasered ore. Each laser can mine a percentage of ore from the asteroids. (see below)

The laser can be used as a weapon even though it has a range less than a standard laser weapons. Unlike standard laser weapons the mining laser is in a fixed position and does not change position. The mining laser is a power hog and makes a bad weapon during a battle as a main weapon and is a save-our-skins maneuver. (I generated them out the standard laser table in basic sourcebook and TOS sourcebook.) The average mining laser is capable of blasting out a 100 kilograms of ore per round and only a percentage of that ore is capable of being used as it is a mix of other raw materials that taint the asteroid.

Class - US’s - power - damage - Range - shots - Available
Class A - 5 - 32 - 20 - 2/5,000/15,000/50,000 - 1 - 22nd century
Class B - 7 - 34 - 40 - 3/6,000/18,000/70,000 - 1 - late 22nd
Class C - 9 - 36 - 60 - 3/7,500/23,000/75,000 - 1 - early 23rd
Class D - 12 - 38 - 80 - 4/10,000/30,000/80,000 - 2 - mid to late 23rd
Class E - 13 - 40 - 100 - 5/13,000/40,000/125,000 - 2 - early 24th

The ore processor is basic processor seen even on DS9 but only extracts the raw materials to be refined else were. Due to the fact that the processor that extracts the useful ore is not refining the material it half as efficient as the Ore Processors on DS9 so the below is the Ore Extraction Processor constructions. This is not really needed as the mixed ore can be transported to a refinery where it would be processed in a standard refinery.

Ore Extraction Processor
SU’s Cost: Size + 5 for processor, + 10 for a fully automated systems, +2 SU’s for the computer monitoring, +1 SU’s per 10% (up to 60%) material extracted from ore.
Power Cost: Equal to the SU’s for power.

The ore is stored in the ships hold. The ship may have a specially designed hold that is dedicated to the storage of the ore once it has been extracted from the other materials.

Percentage of usable ore in asteroid depends on the asteroid. The Asteroid may have only trace amounts of ore, while another asteroid may be saturated with useable ore. A scan of an asteroid can determine the amount of ore in the asteroid that will be available.

Using the Starship Size Table to determine the mass of an Asteroid as raw materials can run heavier than processed materials you can multiply the mass range by four. Your option. To determine the amount of the materials that are in the asteroid I fall back on a FASA rule for designing planets.

Minerals in the asteroid or wherever

Minerals are generated as the following in the five groups. Roll a 2d10 dice to determine the percentage of material that is in the asteroid. Like always setting in die to be the single digit and the other the tens digit gives you a range starting at double 0 up to 99. Subtract the number for the rolled dice. Then it takes ten hours to determine where the mineral veins lay within he asteroid itself before mining can begin.

normal metals (iron, copper, etc.)
special metals (pergium, topalin, ryetalyn and others) -35
radioactives (uranium, etc.) -20
gem stones (diamonds, rubies, flame gems, etc.) -30
Industrial crystals (dilithium, special silicates, etc.) -40

For example an Asteroid that is size ten that is 892 x 756 x 346 meters in size weighing in at over six million metric tons would have the following materials with a rolls that I made for this.

normal metals 20% (mostly iron and copper)
special metals 0%
radioactives 30 % (most of the materials are unusable ores such as Uranium)
gem stones 8% (Unique gems that are worth only a slip of Latium per ton)
Industrial crystals 1% (traces of dilithium dust in the makeup of the asteroid.)

So per round the ship can claim 20% normal metals of the 50% that is extracted form the asteroid by the mining.

normal metals = 10 kilograms per round
special metals = none
radioactives = 15 kilograms per round
gem stones = 4 kilograms per round
Industrial crystals = a half kilogram of dilithium dust per round

So to fill the hold of the ship below it would take the following times
normal metals = 144 days
special metals = none
radioactives = 96 days
gem stones = twenty minutes for each ton that is collected
Industrial crystals = 2893 days for dilithium dust for what good dust is as it needs to be in a solid crystal to be of use.

Dilithium - house rule: with dilithium being over thirty percent the use of the laser will create an instability in the asteroid as the energy is channeled into destructive energies like when the dilithium is used in the warp engine. For each 5 percentages over thirty the difficulty is increased by one. The resulting explosion is 1000 times the size of the asteroid if safety checks are not made in the mining.

Tons and cubic meters house rule: Each type of ore will have a different weight to it so as a blanket rule two cubic meters equal one ton of cargo.

A typical Mining ship (A converted cargo carrier for this posting.)

Miscellaneous Next Generation Starships size 4 – Mining Ship
Class and Type: Civilian mining ship
Commissioning Date: 24th Century

Hull Systems
Size: 4
Length: 140 meters
Beams: 40 meters
Height: 25 meters
Decks: 3
Mass: 100,000 metric tons
SUs Available: 800 -1300
SUs Used: 746

Hull Outer <16>
Hull Inner <16>
Resistance Outer Hull: 6 <6>
Resistance Inner Hull: 6 <6>

Structural Integrity field [1 power/10 Protection/round]
Main: Class 1 (Protection 40/60) <16>
Backup: Class 1 (Protection 20) <8>
Backup: Class 1 (Protection 20) <8>
Specialized hull: Atmospheric Capability <4>
Planetfall Capability <4>

Personnel Systems
Crew/Passengers/Evac: 51/10/500
Crew Quarters
Spartan: 40 <2>
Basic: 10 <2>
Expanded: 5 <1>
Luxury: 4 <4>
Unusual: 2 <2>

Environmental Systems
Basic Life Support [7 Power/round] <16>
Reserve Life Support [4 Power/round] <8>
Emergency Life Support (24 emergency shelters) <8>
Gravity [2 Power/round] <4>
Consumable: one years’ worth <4>
Food Replicators [4 Power/round] <4>
Industrial Replicators
Type: network of small Replicators [2 Power/round] <4>
Medical Facilities: 4 (+1) [4 Power/round] <20>
Recreation Facilities: 2 (one personal holodeck; one small lounge) [4 Power/round] <16>
Personal Transport: Turbolift; Jefferies tubes [2 Power/round] <12>
Fire Suppression System [1 Power/round when active] <4>
Mining Laser Class D [38 power/round of use] <12>
range: 4/10,000/30,000/80,000
location: forward bow
Ore Extraction Processor (50% extraction per round) [26 power/round of use] <26>
Cargo hold: 30,000 cubic meters (5,000 cubic meters standard cargo and supplies and 25,000 cubic meters of ore storage) <1>
Locations:
Escape Pods <1>
Number: 20
Capacity: 2 persons per pod

Propulsion Systems
Warp Drive Nacelles: Type 5 <50>
Speed: 5.0/6.0/7.0 [1 Power/.2 warp speed]
Uprating: package one (+0.1 to all) <6>
PIS: Type A (4 hours of Maximum warp) <2>
Special configuration: Embedded nacelles <16>
Impulse Engine Type: one Class 3 (.5c/.7c) [5/7 Power/round] <15>
Location:
Reaction Control System (.025c) [2 Power/ round when in use] <4>

Power Systems
Warp Engine: Class 3/E (generates 190 Power/round) <44>
Locations:
Impulse Engine[s]: one Class 3 (generate 24 power/engine/round)
Auxiliary Power: 2 reactors (generate 5 Power/reactor/round) <6>
Emergency Power: Type A (generates 25 Power/round) <25>
EPS: Standard Power flow, +100 Power transfer/round <30>
Standard Usable Power:

Operations systems
Bridge: <20>

Computers
Core: [5 Power/round] <8>
Core: [5 Power/round] <8>
ODN <12>

Navigational Deflector [5 Power/round] <16>
Range: 10/20,000/50,000/150,000
Accuracy: 5/6/8/11
Location:

Sensor Systems
Long-range Sensors [5 Power/round] <18>
Range package: Type 2 (Accuracy 3/4/7/10)
High Resolution: 5 Light-years (0.5/0.6 – 1.0/1.1 – 3.5/3.6 – 5.0)
Low Resolution: 12 Light-years (1.0/1.1 – 3.0/3.1 – 8.0/8.1 – 12.0)
Strength Package: Class 5 (strength 5)
Gain Package: Standard (+0)
Coverage: Standard

Lateral Sensors [5 Power/round] <10>
Strength Package: Class 5 (strength 5)
Gain Package: Standard (+0)
Coverage: Standard

Navigational Sensors: [5 Power/round] <10>
Strength Package: Class 5 (strength 5)
Gain Package: Standard (+0)
Probes: none
Sensor Skill: 3

Flight Control Systems
Autopilot: Shipboard systems (flight control) 1, Coordination 0 [1 Power/round in use] <3>

Navigational Computer
Main: Class 1 (+0) [0 Power/round] <0>
Backups: 1 <0>

Inertial Damping Field
Main <16>
Strength: 7 [3 Power/round]
Number: 2
Backup <4>
Strength: 4 [2 Power/round]
Number: 2
Attitude Control [1 Power/round] <1>

Communications Systems
Type: Class 5 [2 Power/round] <10>
Strength: 5
Security: -2
Emergency Communications: [2 Power/round] <1>

Tractor Beams
Emitter: Class Beta [3 Power/Strength used/round] <6>
Accuracy: 5/6/8/11
Lactation: Aft

Emitter: Class Alpha [3 Power/Strength used/round] <3>
Accuracy: 5/6/8/11
Location: hanger bay ventral aft

Transporters
Type: Personnel [3 Power/use] <10>
Pads: 4
Emitter/Receiver Array: Personnel Type 3 (25,000 km range)
Energizing/Transition Coils: Class E (strength 5)
Number and location:

Type: Cargo [2 Power/round] <8>
Pads: 200 kilograms
Emitter/Receiver Array: Cargo Type 2 (20,000 km range)
Energizing/Transition Coils: Class E (strength 5)
Number and location:

Security Systems Rating: 1 <4>
Anti-Intruder System: [1 Power/round] <4>
Internal Force Field [1 Power/3 Strength] <4>
Science Systems Rating: 1 (+0) [1 Power/round] <9>
Specialized Systems: none
Laboratories: 1 <2>

Tactical Systems
Plasma Beam weapons/Energy weapons <8 x 2 = 16>
Type equal to a Type IV phaser array
Damage: 80 [8 Power]
Number of Emitters: 80 (up to 2 shots per round)
Targeting Systems: Class Alpha Accuracy 5/6/8/11
Range: 10/30,000/100,000/300,000
Location: one forward, one aft
Firing arc: 180 degrees
Firing Modes: Standard and Pulse

TA/T/TS: Class Alpha [0 Power/round] <6>
Strength: 7
Bonus: +0
Weapon Skill: 3

Shields (Forward, Aft, Port, Starboard) <21 x 4 = 84>
Shield Generator: Class 2 (protection 250 (+100 embedded nacelles)) [25 Power/shield/round]
Shield grid: Type B (33% increase to 340 Protection)
Subspace field Distortion Amplifiers: Class Beta (Threshold 83 (+10 embedded nacelles))
Recharging System: Class 1 (45 seconds)
Backup Shield Generators: 4 (1 per shield) <4>
Auto-Destruct System <4>

Auxiliary Spacecraft systems
Shuttlebay(s): Capacity for 4 Size worth of ships <8>
Standard Complement: 2 Shuttlepods and 1 shuttlecraft
Location(s):

[Coalition]

Mining ships

One of our players was showing me the Star Trek Fleet Commander game on his pad where he was mining ore from an asteroid. So I decided to generate the following. Why mine when a replicator can produce almost anything that the heart desires but for some reason the need to mine is there. I guess not everything can be replicated or the need for the materials that are needed to be used in the replicator

Mining Lasers

A typical mining laser is a combination of a laser, tractor beam and mineral processing system capable of lasering portions of rock from an asteroid tractor beaming it into and extracting the useful materials from the lasered ore. Each laser can mine a percentage of ore from the asteroids. (see below)

The laser can be used as a weapon even though it has a range less than a standard laser weapons. Unlike standard laser weapons the mining laser is in a fixed position and does not change position. The mining laser is a power hog and makes a bad weapon during a battle as a main weapon and is a save-our-skins maneuver. (I generated them out the standard laser table in basic sourcebook and TOS sourcebook.) The average mining laser is capable of blasting out a 100 kilograms of ore per round and only a percentage of that ore is capable of being used as it is a mix of other raw materials that taint the asteroid.

Class - SU’s - power - damage - Range - shots - Available
Class A - 5 - 32 - 20 - 2/5,000/15,000/50,000 - 1 - 22nd century
Class B - 7 - 34 - 40 - 3/6,000/18,000/70,000 - 1 - late 22nd
Class C - 9 - 36 - 60 - 3/7,500/23,000/75,000 - 1 - early 23rd
Class D - 12 - 38 - 80 - 4/10,000/30,000/80,000 - 2 - mid to late 23rd
Class E - 13 - 40 - 100 - 5/13,000/40,000/125,000 - 2 - early 24th

Mining is needed to provide the physical material needed to produce items. As an example, the Particle Fountain Project was an attempt to improve Federation mining capabilities.

There are also plenty of items that cannot be replicated and were plot-critical in ST:TNG. (Let alone that it was easier to trade for items on DS9 than talk to Federation personnel to replicate items)

If a mining laser is capable of removing 100 kg of material per round, why would someone use anything but the Class A version above? Unless the advanced versions produce more than 100 kg at a time (100 kg for Class A, 200 kg for Class B, 300 kg for Class C, aso)

The ore processor is basic processor seen even on DS9 but only extracts the raw materials to be refined else were. Due to the fact that the processor that extracts the useful ore is not refining the material it half as efficient as the Ore Processors on DS9 so the below is the Ore Extraction Processor constructions. This is not really needed as the mixed ore can be transported to a refinery where it would be processed in a standard refinery.

Ore Extraction Processor
SU’s Cost: Size + 5 for processor, + 10 for a fully automated systems, +2 SU’s for the computer monitoring, +1 SU’s per 10% (up to 60%) material extracted from ore.
Power Cost: Equal to the SU’s for power.

The ore is stored in the ships hold. The ship may have a specially designed hold that is dedicated to the storage of the ore once it has been extracted from the other materials.

Would the Ore Processor be better phrased as an ability to handle X amount off material per day? Make it part of a much larger ship or station with lots of cargo bay capacity. Mining ships (like the one below) drop off their raw ore, and are paid based on best estimate of what is present (or if they trust the ore processing station to be honest). The station then spends the next several days (weeks?) processing the ore into its relative components, emptying one set of cargo bays of the raw ore, and filling up those bays with the final products (and any slag). When the cargo bays are full of refined materials, another set of freighters come along and pick up the material. Very steady work, but also very boring. Unless the shipping scheduler gets their calendar wrong and has the miners drop off their raw ore before the freighter arrives to pick up the refined material, and there isn't enough room in the cargo bays to handle both loads of material. Looks like someone gets to organize an EVA expedition to store the refined goods outside the station in giant nets (or pay the miners to sit on their ship and do nothing until after the freighter is finished).

Figure the Ore Processor can handle X amount of material per day per SU, plus a bonus amount based on the mounting platform's size. This would allow DS9's Ore Processing to be noticeable, since it would be among the larger orbital material refining.

The Ore extraction processor might even be specialized based on one of the types of materials (normal, special, radioactives, gems, dilithium, etc). So you could have a mining ship/crew that is saving up to get an Ore Processor for their ship that specializes in handling gems, hoping that the gems they find will be worth the amount of cargo space taken up by the processor. The remaining material is then left at the asteroid for someone else to deal with (updating the database of the Prospector, or the local Asteroid Miner's Guild records).

Percentage of usable ore in asteroid depends on the asteroid. The Asteroid may have only trace amounts of ore, while another asteroid may be saturated with useable ore. A scan of an asteroid can determine the amount of ore in the asteroid that will be available.

Using the Starship Size Table to determine the mass of an Asteroid as raw materials can run heavier than processed materials you can multiply the mass range by four. Your option. To determine the amount of the materials that are in the asteroid I fall back on a FASA rule for designing planets.

Minerals in the asteroid or wherever

Minerals are generated as the following in the five groups. Roll a 2d10 dice to determine the percentage of material that is in the asteroid. Like always setting in die to be the single digit and the other the tens digit gives you a range starting at double 0 up to 99. Subtract the number for the rolled dice. Then it takes ten hours to determine where the mineral veins lay within he asteroid itself before mining can begin.

normal metals (iron, copper, etc.)
special metals (pergium, topalin, ryetalyn and others) -35
radioactives (uranium, etc.) -20
gem stones (diamonds, rubies, flame gems, etc.) -30
Industrial crystals (dilithium, special silicates, etc.) -40

For example an Asteroid that is size ten that is 892 x 756 x 346 meters in size weighing in at over six million metric tons would have the following materials with a rolls that I made for this.

normal metals 20% (mostly iron and copper)
special metals 0%
radioactives 30 % (most of the materials are unusable ores such as Uranium)
gem stones 8% (Unique gems that are worth only a slip of Latium per ton)
Industrial crystals 1% (traces of dilithium dust in the makeup of the asteroid.)

So per round the ship can claim 20% normal metals of the 50% that is extracted form the asteroid by the mining.

normal metals = 10 kilograms per round
special metals = none
radioactives = 15 kilograms per round
gem stones = 4 kilograms per round
Industrial crystals = a half kilogram of dilithium dust per round

So to fill the hold of the ship below it would take the following times
normal metals = 144 days
special metals = none
radioactives = 96 days
gem stones = twenty minutes for each ton that is collected
Industrial crystals = 2893 days for dilithium dust for what good dust is as it needs to be in a solid crystal to be of use.

Dilithium - house rule: with dilithium being over thirty percent the use of the laser will create an instability in the asteroid as the energy is channeled into destructive energies like when the dilithium is used in the warp engine. For each 5 percentages over thirty the difficulty is increased by one. The resulting explosion is 1000 times the size of the asteroid if safety checks are not made in the mining.

Tons and cubic meters house rule: Each type of ore will have a different weight to it so as a blanket rule two cubic meters equal one ton of cargo.

For the mining beam, I could see several generations of it:
Early: a Physical drill/scoop, similar to modern drills that just grind away the rock, and the scoop keeps the material from getting away. Useful for low-cost mining and dealing with dustballs
Mid-level: pure laser setup, on low-power it can perform spectroscopic analysis of the asteroid (so you get the percentages before needing to rendezvous with it), and at close-range it vaporizes the material which is then contained using some sort of 'tent' around the lasing site. The laser would be fairly light, while the tent is heavier.
Trek level: your above listed tractor beam systems that pull material off the target asteroid and into a cargo bay to be processed

All three have advantages:
Physical drill/scoop: cheap, easy to maintain, and low power
Laser: get the percentages for multiple asteroids at once, and mine the one that has the best numbers. Mounting a second laser on a turret means you can do multiple spectroscope examinations while processing an existing asteroid
Tractor beam: gather material from an asteroid at a safe distance, reducing the damage it takes if there is a dilithium explosion

You could even have prospector ships that have laser spectrometers and a LOT of probes. Their entire job is to cruise through an asteroid belt, scanning each asteroid, and using a probe to mark it with an identification beacon. Follow-up ships would then use the probe beacons (with a database provided by the Prospector) to identify which asteroids they want to mine. The usage of a database means you don't have to worry as much about claim jumpers, since only those that can access the database will know that beacon FF63R8 is the one with several unusual (valuable) gems in it, while beacon FF63R9 is the one with a high dilithium content that if you mine it wrong it will blow up in your face.

A typical Mining ship (A converted cargo carrier for this posting.)

Miscellaneous Next Generation Starships size 4 – Mining Ship
Class and Type: Civilian mining ship
Commissioning Date: 24th Century

Hull Systems
Size: 4
Length: 140 meters
Beams: 40 meters
Height: 25 meters
Decks: 3
Mass: 100,000 metric tons
SUs Available: 800 -1300
SUs Used: 746

Hull & Structural Integrity field snipped for space

Personnel Systems
Crew/Passengers/Evac: 51/10/500
Crew Quarters
Spartan: 40 <2>
Basic: 10 <2>
Expanded: 5 <1>
Luxury: 4 <4>
Unusual: 2 <2>

Environmental Systems, Basic Life Support, through Fire Suppression - snipped for space
Mining Laser Class D [38 power/round of use] <12>
range: 4/10,000/30,000/80,000
location: forward bow
Ore Extraction Processor (50% extraction per round) [26 power/round of use] <26>
Cargo hold: 30,000 cubic meters (5,000 cubic meters standard cargo and supplies and 25,000 cubic meters of ore storage) <1>
Locations:
Escape Pods (snipped for space)

Propulsion Systems - snipped for space
Power Systems - snipped for space
Operations systems, Computers, Navigational Deflector - snipped for space
Sensor Systems - snipped for space
Inertial Damping Field - snipped for space
Communications Systems - snipped for space
Tractor Beams - snipped for space
Transporters - snipped for space
Security Systems - snipped for space
Tactical Systems - snipped for space
Auxiliary Spacecraft systems - snipped for space

For the mining ship, did you convert an existing ship, or is it almost a new design?

I'd be tempted to remove the atmospheric capability and planetfall capabilities, freeing up 8 SU that way. Make this a basic space-only design that travels from asteroid to asteroid, and dropping off its cargo at a smelting ship or station while the crew spends their pay for the few days they are seeing someone other than each other. You'd still need another 1 SU from somewhere to put an Ore Processing facility onboard (size 4 ship, + 5 SU for a basic Ore Processor = 9 SU).

Perhaps reducing the Personnel systems to something a bit more 'rough' would be better. Drop half the Luxury, and divide it evenly to Basic and Expanded giving you room for 15 more people?


Very nice ideas, thank you for working on them

[Omega1967]

To start with if you look around you may find my particle fountain posted somewhere here. Here I will post it here later. The difference I think the fountain used transporter tech to transport the materials from the subsurface without damaging the surface structure where the mining laser destroys the surface to get to the minerals to bring aboard.

The ship is freighter that I added the mining laser into was for any adventure that needed a freighter that was just generic without having an origin. Drop the mining laser and you have a useable freighter that can be just about anyone’s that needs one.

I figure that they use the laser to break the raw ore up and then the tractor beam pulls it into the hold then the raw ore processors take out the ore. The ore is transported to a facility where it is refined into a purer form that can be used either in something like a replicator or fabrication unit or even an old fashion foundry.

And yes the extraction is specialized to the material that the ship is extracting. A dilithium mining vessel may be able to extract some other crystals without too much trouble but if it wanted to extract ore that may be needed to construct a starship it would have to retool the ships mining and extraction systems to handle those types of equipment. Yet I would think that a ship could have more than one type of extractor set up but you begin to loose space in your hold as the extractors would take up space needed for the cargo.

What I found odd about Star Trek Fleet Commander was a Frigate that is capable of combat as its primary function was able to mine minerals. That I think is a waste of a ships as a protection resource for your base. Yet I like that the Starbase had refineries for Dilithium, titanium, duranium and gases used in construction which makes the base self-sufficient. There was another material that they mined in the game but I cannot think of it right now.

For the mining beam I would agree that there should be an early physical grinding and blasting using explosives as my grandfather worked in after leaving the army from the Second World War. Some manual labor would be involved in this and would take much longer to collect the materials as it would require several shifts as working in a space suit would be tiring as it was wearing scuba equipment.

The prospector ship I didn’t even think about that there was one shown in the first season of Babylon 5 that scanned planets for ores and Cyrano Jones from Star Trek the Original Series ‘Trouble with Tribbles’ piloted a prospecting ship when he wasn’t selling the troublesome Tribbles.

If you think about it a company could have several prospector ships surveying a sector while mining ships extract ore and deliver it to a refinery ship while freighters deliver the refined materials to the consumer. This would be an expanding group of ships that could also turn a sector of habitable worlds into inhospitable wastelands.

For mining Dilithium I would say yes to it going boom. Dilithium has been the cause of several planets and starships disasters.

I gave the ship the atmospheric capability and planetfall capabilities because it may be mining a planets surface sometimes and asteroids others. Besides the ship already had the atmospheric capability and planetfall capabilities as it could land to deliver cargo that cannot be transported safely.

This addition can be modified in endless ways that expand it into such that makes it a serious interesting topic of discussion for spacedock.

If I am not back sooner, Happy holidays.